An Arctic gift-wrapped in plastic?

Let’s hope not. But—. All of us who’ve traveled long and far have seen the amount of plastic on beaches increase incredibly in our lifetime. And it isn’t slowing anytime soon.

The worst plastic accumulations I’ve seen are in the tropics, near where most of the people are. A lot of it comes to the ocean down rivers—80 percent or so.

The rest comes from fishing ships, freight lost overboard, and from so many other things people do. I’ve seen it on reefs, beaches, the open ocean—it’s a mess. But far beyond the tropics, I’ve also been shocked by how much I’ve seen in Alaska, pretty “far” from dense populations of people. Thing is, nowhere is “far” from people any more. The world is smaller than it seems. People, and the things that come from people, get pretty much everywhere now.